Comfortable, class-privileged people have a lot of funny ideas about violence.
First among these, popular with “peace activists,” is the idea that an industrial state can exist without the violence of war—war between nations, war against the living planet, war against its own population. Yet war and imperialism are the basis of the state, going all the way back to the first ones to ooze out of the Stygian ether of Mesopotamia. State violence is inherent and systemic. You can have (relative) peace, or you can have the state, but you can’t have both.
Another funny idea is that nonviolence is some kind of moral imperative, rather than a tactic (a tactic, historically speaking, of extremely limited use to oppressed people; far more effective during most of state history has been escape). This is essentially a religious idea, based on blind faith and ignorance of the realities of violence & power.
My personal favorite is that old classic, “violence never solves anything,” often teamed up with its cousin, “violence begets violence.” I suspect Crazy Horse, Harriet Tubman, and the Zapatistas would disagree. For that matter, I knew a woman who once narrowly foiled a rape attempt by stabbing her attacker and leaving him to bleed out in a parking lot. Not only did violence solve that problem rather effectively, but it also might have guaranteed that the would-be perpetrator will never have the opportunity to rape anyone else. No further violence begotten.
Nursed on cowboy fairytales and other propaganda, some people are convinced that firearms have the magical ability to prevent violence. They’re so sure of this, in fact, that they stockpile massive quantities of guns & ammo. These are mostly Republifascist white men—probably the least endangered demographic in the general population (except for their own overdoses and suicides). All of the evidence shows that more firearms lead to more violence—from accidental shootings to suicides and homicides—but in my experience the kind of people who believe that guns automatically make you safer are immune to the influence of evidence.
Official statistics show that firearms are rarely used by civilians in self-defense. However, to be fair, there’s really no way of telling how dodgy those numbers are, for the same reason that the rates of sexual violence are likely to be dramatically underestimated—people who successfully “discourage” attackers by deploying a firearm, like rape and molestation victims, are unlikely to report it to institutional authorities. I’ve personally met several civilians who’ve induced a rapid change-of-mind in assailants by pulling a gun (and, in a few instances, by returning fire), and I’ve met many women who’ve been raped and/or molested. None of them filed a police report.
Comfortable, class-privileged people, whether they are aware of it or not, benefit from a world in which their violence is largely subsidized—violence by past invaders got them the land they live on; violence by soldiers and corporations gets them the resources that make their lifestyles possible; violence by cops against poor folks and political dissidents ensures that they get to keep their class privileges.
America’s ongoing efforts at maintaining global domination are currently being subsidized by death and destruction in Ukraine. Fighting a proxy war with Russia, a country with a staggering collection of nuclear weapons, is unforgivably stupid. Continually sabotaging attempts at a diplomatic resolution is even worse (the only thing dumber would be… provoking a war with China). But here’s the thing: regardless of how many Ukrainians or Russians are killed, the most dangerous thing about this war is not the war itself. That might seem like a cold thing to say, I know, but hear me out.
In 2006 I was bartending at a nightclub in L.A. Chinatown when I decided I was going to become a superhero. Rest assured, I didn’t bear any foolish delusions about “fighting crime.” My purpose, instead, was to make the entire space that I was in more magical, and therefore more enjoyable, for all of the people who were coming out to party in this environment that I dearly loved. Sporting a ninja mask and fetish suit, I danced at the bar and did kungfu tricks; I made a habit of learning as many people’s names as possible so I could greet them personally; I flirted with women and diverted creepers, and generally had a marvelous time being a trickster.
Most of the patrons loved this act, but not all of them. Some people are allergic to fun, and get irate when they feel others are having too much of it.
There was a group of young Chicanas who came to the club regularly. I called them the Aztlanteca Crew. They were all gorgeous. They loved music and dancing. They drank like there was no tomorrow. Naturally, we were fast friends. One night, they showed up with a male friend they’d never brought before. Near the end of the night, I was outside having a smoke break and joshing around with these drunken ladies, and their friend didn’t like it. Somewhat sauced myself, it took me a moment to notice that he was attempting to physically push me away from them; having been a martial artist for many years, I’d automatically shifted my weight in such a way that he failed to actually move me. Then I got upset that he was putting his hands on me, and I decided to fuck with him.
It’s easy to provoke a hostile reaction from most dudes; all you have to do is get gay on them. I pointed out to him that if he was touching me it must be because he found me attractive, then I felt up his chest and kissed him on the cheek. This was a move I’d used successfully on several other occasions; usually, the guy would freeze, then yell and shove me away. Then I would act like I didn’t understand what the problem was, apologize, and leave. I would triumph in these encounters because I was in control… and because it was hilarious to anyone watching. Top-monkey status achieved.
Well, that’s not how it went down on this particular occasion. Instead, the guy froze into a statue, balled up his fists, and growled at me: Do something.
Now, I’m going to explain what I did next using reason and logic, but that’s entirely an after-the-fact reconstruction, because at the moment it happened I responded instinctively; there wasn’t time to think it out. Something about the guy’s stance, voice, and energy told me that he was looking for an excuse to take a lifetime of accumulated hostility out on me—itching to beat me within an inch of my life. He was bigger and stronger than me. I knew that if the fists started flying, I was going to have to seriously injure if not kill this guy, lest he do it to me first.
And for what? Pride? Ego? That is not the True Path of the Buddha Who Prevails Over Struggle.
I perceived the situation, ceased my act, and stepped slightly to the guy’s side, giving me a superior position—more difficult for him to hit me if he swings, easier for me to get behind him and counterattack from his blind spot. I leaned in like I was telling him a secret and said: I am doing something, bro—I’m talking to you. I’m just trying to tell you that I don’t like it when people I don’t know put their hands on me. Do you?
He backed off, we shook hands, and I went back inside. Crisis averted. Epilogue: at my request, the Aztlanteca Crew never brought him back to the club.
This was a social situation in which horrible violence could have happened, which I would have provoked by being a smart-ass… but if violence had popped off, my ass is the one that would’ve been on the line. I would’ve shed blood for my arrogance, probably ended up in the hospital (I’m a hemophiliac), andpossibly lost my life. And even if I won the fight, I might have caught a case (might being the key word; this is Chinatown we’re talking about after all).
Instead, I engaged in tactical deescalation. I diffused the situation… but I did so while stacking the odds in my favor in case that didn’t work. As the saying goes, a warrior may choose pacifism; all others are condemned to it.
Which brings me the long way around to my point: the most dangerous thing about American warmongering in Ukraine, and state warmongering generally, is that the people doing the provoking are not the ones whose asses are on the line.
No matter how many children’s body parts are flying, no matter how many soldiers cry for their mothers and bleed, no matter how many homes become rubble, Joe “The Shill Supreme” Biden, a.k.a. Joey Botox, and all his arms-dealing collaborators will go home to their comfy beds in their big houses and never so much as drip sweat. Their level of removal from violence makes it easy for them to continue provoking violence. And, being arms-dealers, it’s how they make their money; the war in Ukraine is a glorified plot to increase their already grotesque wealth.
Lack of consequences for those of higher status is the nature of hierarchical systemic violence. To use a common example: statistically, you probably eat meat. Have you ever slaughtered livestock? Me neither. But I’ve seen it done; when I was four years old I watched my Filipina babysitter’s extended family butcher a live goat. I had nightmares for weeks, and it still gives me chills to remember the flies buzzing around the white ceramic bowl full of congealing blood that had poured out of the creature’s cut throat. Yet, as an adult, I realize that this was far more respectful and humane than the mass-murder & torture factories that most of us rely on for burgers.
Back when I was a university student and even more cynical than I am now, I held a deep loathing for my fellow students who were running around in Nike sneakers and Gap t-shirts protesting Bush II’s war in Iraq. It was obvious to everyone that the war was ultimately about securing access to oil, yet nobody seemed to understand that our entire consumer lifestyle is completely dependent on fossil fuels… and therefore war. The way I saw it, they were only against the war because it hurt their feelings. They were Good Liberals. Well, fuck their feelings.
With the heightened possibility of nuclear war sending the Doomsday Clock spinning, one could argue that everyone’s asses are on the line… which is certainly true, but there’s another ingredient here that makes it much easier for rich idiots to play provocateur from a position of vast remove: nobody has ever been in a nuclear war.
I’ve been punched, kicked, thrown, tackled, and cut by knives. I know what that’s like. Maybe you do, too. But none of us has ever watched the center of our city disappear in a mushroom cloud.
Sure, I’ve read at length about wall-shadows in Hiroshima, nuclear winter, and reactor meltdowns. I’ve read all of Joshua Frank’s chilling articles about Hanford. But none of that changes the fact that we’re talking about a kind of war that no human being has ever experienced. From that standpoint, it remains firmly in the realm of science-fiction.
That said, I’ll never know what it would’ve been like to fight to the death with some random asshole in a Chinatown courtyard either, and I’m fine with that. Sensible people don’t need to go through a horrific disaster before they decide it’s worth every effort to avoid.
The problem is, the people running the show are not sensible people. They’re super-villains.
Escape is no longer an option; there’s nowhere left to go. Even if there was, a nuclear holocaust would leave no place on earth untouched. If we want to stop the Joey Botoxes of the world from provoking their way into Armageddon, we’re going to need some serious tactics, as well as both the capability and the willingness to back our play with force if necessary. Everything else is just talk.
Get out your fetish suits, motherfuckers. It’s time.
The Temple of DZA 